The present invention relates to a novel assembly for facilitating the manual lifting and attachment of a heavyweight reel, spool, wheel or other relatively-narrow wheel-like element, hereinafter referred to as a reel, having a central bore, a core or bearing provided with such a bore, said reel having a diameter substantially greater than its width. Most particularly, the present invention relates to an assembly for facilitating the frequent replacement of heavy, narrow rolls of wound paper on a high speed printing apparatus, manually by a single person. Such paper rolls generally have a diameter of from about two to three feet, a width of from 4 to 71/2 inches and a weight of from 50 to 200 pounds.
The manual lifting of such heavyweight reels, particularly several times each day, is burdensome, physically dangerous and can be destructive to the paper roll if it is dropped or telescopes from its supporting core.
A variety of jacking devices, winches and other lifting devices are known for lifting wheels or reels onto supporting shafts. Reference is made to U.S. Pat. Nos. 475,021; 4,402,467 and 4,593,883 for their disclosures of such devices. Prior-known devices have several important disadvantages. Generally, they do not contain any means for locking them in predetermined raised position, or for aligning and facilitating the transfer of the reel to the receptive shaft, or for simple removal and out-of-the-way storage during periods of nonuse.